This invention relates to stabilizing the movement of containers on a conveyor and indexing the movement of the containers with respect to the movement of the conveyor. The stabilization minimizes the problem of the containers tipping over or pushing too hard against each other. Indexing the movement of the containers with respect to the movement of the conveyor allows the position of the containers to be known on the conveyor.
In the prior art, containers such as plastic bottles are moved on conveyors. As shown in FIG. 1, the bottles are placed on a feed conveyor, that moves them to a dead plate. From the dead plate the bottles are pushed on to a second conveyor where the bottles are divided into two lanes of bottles using a diverging plate. The second conveyor usually moves about half the speed of the feed conveyor to accommodate the formation of the two lanes of bottles. The same procedure can be used to create four lanes of bottles.
During a lane formation or transition from a dead plate or to another conveyor or as the speed of the conveyor changes there is a tendency to create gaps between the bottles or to increase the backpressure on the bottles. These gaps between the bottles can result in the bottles tipping over especially when one bottle pushes too hard against another bottle due to the backpressure or when the speed of the conveyor changes. Also backpressure can create clogging in the lanes thereby impeding the flow of the containers. The art has recognized the need to be able to reduce the gaps and the backpressure on the bottles during the operation of the conveyor.
The creation of new lanes in the prior art required increasing the width or length of the conveyor to accommodate new lanes. The need for a conveyor that allows the creation of new lanes without substantially increasing the length or width of the conveyor has not been solved by the prior art.
The movement of the containers from the various conveyors results in the bottles in each lane not being aligned with respect to the movement of a conveyor. This non-alignment of the container interferes with the ability of the conveyor to accommodate downstream operations that depend on the location of the containers.
An objective of this invention is to stabilize the movement of containers along a conveyor from tipping over and to reduce the gaps and backpressure between the containers. This is accomplished by a synchronization means for positioning the containers with a predetermined spacing. By controlling the spacing, one can establish the desired gap between the containers. The ability to positioning the containers on the conveyor acts to index the location of a container with respect to the speed of the conveyor. Also this positioning of the containers acts to reduce the backpressure by establishing a predetermined relationship between the bottles. Another benefit of positioning the containers is that the containers in each lane can be synchronized with each other.
Another object of this invention is a means for creating new lanes without substantially increasing the width or length of the conveyor. The means for creating a new lane includes a set of overhead conveyors to push the containers from adjacent lanes to form a new lane.
A further objective is to provide a bundling means for moving a predetermined number of containers from one station such as a conveyor or dead plate to another station. The bundling means includes a conveyor to push the predetermined number of containers onto a station for further processing. The further processing-can be a film wrapping station followed by a heat shrink station.